The Witches of World War II — Paul Cornell

“Vengefully imaginative occult rewrite of wartime history, full of sharp knife twists, proving yet again that Cornell is a storyteller to cherish.” — Chuck Wendig Inspired by a true story, The Witches of World War II follows a coven of witches as they embark on a mission to help capture Adolf Hitler's second-in-command, Rudolf Hess.This magic kills fascists! In the darkest hours of World War 2, Doreen Valiente, a junior intelligence officer, twenty years old and already a war widow, is approached by a British General who tells her he knows she’s a witch... and that’s how she can best serve her country. Valiente, an expert on British folklore and the occult, is to use her connections in this peculiar community to recruit a group of British ‘magicians’ and use their “skills” to gain some advantage over the Nazi high command, who believe fervently “in all this occult rubbish.” Together with Aleister Crowley, the self-proclaimed “Most Evil Man in the World” Valiente recruits a hard-nosed white witch Dion Fortune, the grizzled and gray-bearded founder of Wicca Gerald Gardner, and exorcist and con man in a turban Rollo Ahmed. Together this coven of witches will travel deep into the heart of Nazi-occupied Europe and gamble their lives, their beliefs, and their powers on a mission to help capture Rudolf Hess, fervent occultist, and second in command to Adolf Hitler himself. Inspired by the incredible true story of the New Forest coven and Operation Cone of Power.